Stay on target

A few months ago I wrote a feature about how Wario is so much more than a wacky, evil Mario. “He’s Nintendo outlet for self-parody and deconstruction. He’s the Watchmen of Nintendo franchises.” But it turns out there are depths to this gross, garlic-eating guy that we hadn’t realized. A recently uncovered YouTube comment dropped the bomb that Wario is, in fact, German.

Or rather, Wario was originally intended to be German. Wario Forums(!) user Glowsquid translated a year-old YouTube comment by actor Thomas Spindler. A former Nintendo of Europe translation employee, Spindler voiced Wario in the Japanese versions of Mario Kart 64 and the first two Mario Party games. Few noticed at the time, but Spindler confirmed Wario speaks several lines in German in those games such as “So ein Mist!” or “Aw, crap!”

“The concept behind Wario was that of a German character and those responsible for the voice-overs at Nintendo back then intended him to speak German,” said Spindler in the comment.

Not to offend the fine people of Germany, when you look at Wario now, you can see how a German heritage may have been the original plan. Compare him to perhaps the most famous German Nintendo character, Von Kaiser of Punch-Out!!. It’s all in the mustache and bad attitude. At some point after these games, however, Nintendo changed its mind and made Wario Italian. He is Mario’s evil twin after all, so it makes sense they’d have the same national origins. Or maybe that’s the only accent Charles Martinet (Mario and Wario’s current voice actor) can do.

I hope Wario’s German roots come into play in some future game. In the next WarioWare, his game company crashes, and he returns home to find himself. And what if other Nintendo characters have hidden nationalities? What if Link is French, not Hylian? What if Donkey Kong named his island after himself after emigrating from war-torn Rwanda? What if Mario is secretly German, too?